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1470071 tn?1297625078

Percocet relapse for the 2nd time

Hi to all and happy new year to all...If you can see my history I was using percocet and quit on my 30th birthday back in september...I lasted about 3 1/2 weeks and started using again.  I quit again after thanksgiving for a whole week then slowly started using again..now I'm up to my old ways again.  So this will be my 3rd time quitting.  How common is relapsing?  I feel like such a loser, dummy, etc... The 2nd time I quit i wrote this long letter to myself telling myself it wasn't fair to myself, my kids, my husband for me to use and promised myself that I would NEVER allow myself to get back there again - and it hasn't even been a lousy month and I'm here again.  I feel like I could lose my family if I keep doing this, and In my heart and mind i WANT to quit for GOOD - so WHY do I keep coming back?  Why?  I'm a mess...Im so anxious because I know what tomorrow and the next few days have in store, the anxiety, panic, depression, lack of sleep, sweats, aches, etc....worried about work on monday, etc..
I don't know what I need right now. A friend, someone to tell me what an idiot I am for relapsing...I just feel lost.  I know I'm stopping as of now, but I need to STAY clean...my husband is being so understanding and i feel like such a loser..
11 Responses
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696149 tn?1314320959
I'm on my 5th time quitting and just on my 5th day with w/d's.  No sleep but sneezing has almost completely stopped but I still feel pretty crappy.  I was off for a year and a half and I did something very stupid.  I had a kidney stone about 5 months ago and I put up with it for a few days.  I finally went to the ER and I wasn't looking for pain pills.  I wanted them to extract it or blow it up....something.  They sent me home the first time and said it would pass.  It didn't so I wound up going back again and this time they did a CT scan and saw it (the first time they didn't do anything).  

Ah, now to the problem, they admitted me to the hospital for 24 hrs to try and flush it out.  They offered me Dilaudid and said I could have it every 4 hours.  Now I was thinking...well I'm not really craving anything, but hey, I deserve to feel good and then I'll simply go back to normal living....WRONG!  That stuff made me feel soooo good.  I'm lucky I didn't try Heroin or something after that.  They sent me home with pain pills after a day and that's where I picked up and saw a urologist and I lied to him and said I still had pain, long after it had passed.

I got cut off a couple weeks ago and then I saw my psychiatrist and I said, the Vicodin seems to help me so he one a day shouldn't hurt.  Right, like I could take just one a day.  I took 30 tabs in 3 days and here I am now.

I feel like crap but I know that it will pass because I've done this before a few times.

The good news is that your craving for the drug will diminish allot after a while.  Just don't make the mistake of thinking you can handle it again if something else happens that requires you to take pain meds.

This is where you have to stop listening to your mind (and I'm telling myself this as much as you) and just know it will stop.  You may feel like you're gonna die if you don't have it, but I promise, you won't.  You'll even feel happy again after awhile.

Personally, I have to go cold turkey to get off the darn things....I can't just wean myself off.  If you can do by weaning, then by all means do so, but from the sound of things you can't.

Some drugs can help with the w/d and Clonidine is one of them, but I just recently found something that worked for me.  I don't know that it would work for you, but I found Seroquel seemed to cut w/d symptoms about 50% for me.  Seroquel is a heavy anti-psychotic.  No, I'm not psychotic, but as well with other drugs it has many uses and for me they gave it to me for my bi-polar disorder.  It will make you sleepy at first....well if take 100mg or so but that goes away after awhile.  I hope you get relief soon.  Just know that this feeling you're feeling will go away and to make things hopefully easier for you, you're family is more important than the drug.  I know, it's much easier said than done, but you can do it.  It's just ignoring the cravings and feelings you have right now, which is the hardest.
Helpful - 0
1481358 tn?1288295091
I dont know many people that can  quit first time. Dont be to hard on yourself. You know now for sure you  just cant have any. You know that now. So no excuses. Ive done the same thing. Were the type of people that can have NONE.No big dea. Youll do this.
Helpful - 0
52704 tn?1387020797
End Your Addictiln Now, by Charles Gant
Eating Right to Live Sober, by Katherine Ketcham
The Mood Cure, by Julian Ross
Seven Weeks to Sobriety, by Joan Larson

These are all good books that offer concrete diet solutions.  Keep in mind that everything you experience vis a vis the wanting and the needing is all in your head . . . it's all very real, it simply takes place in your brain.

I think that brain chemistry is a critical part of recovery, and diet it a critical part of brain chemistry.  We need a diet that helps us produce the needed neurotransmitters, which get so far out of balance with extended using that we become unable to feel good without our drug of choice.  

Right now your brain is loaded with endorphin receptors (more were created to make use of the extra artificial-endorphin you have been providing) that are screaming to be filled . . . but you've decided to stop taking the pills that they've become dependant on (natural endorphin production has been all but shut down due to the artifical excess).

Balance and good feeling can be restored quicker than you think . . . but don't use at all, or you reactivae your addiction and you're back where you started.

CATUF
2035
Helpful - 0
271792 tn?1334979657
Did you ever hear the saying "One is too many, and a thousand is never enough"? I think you are finding out about that the hard way.

I know how hard the mental side of this disease is. I live it every day, we all do. For me, I had to get outside support to teach me how to live life without the use of drugs. I did that through the fellowship of NA. There I have found a group of people just like me who are all learning. It is where I have made my friends and it is my life line. If that is not for you, maybe a church group or counseling would help you. Either way I believe you will need to do something. If you stay in your own head and make your own decisions at this juncture, I fear you will go back to using.

I wish you the best and hope you stick around.
Helpful - 0
1470071 tn?1297625078
Thanks for your replies.  Right now I just feel like the "wanting" that feeling will never stop.  How do you get past it?  For 29 years I was a HAPPY, carefree, loving person.  I want to be that person I was a year ago and the fear that I can't or never will be terrifies me.  I know I can get thru the physical w/d because I've done it twice in the past 4 months.  The first 2 weeks I will be okay. Then I'll get a headache and take "just that one" pill.   And the cycle starts over.  Guess I have to say no to that one pill, huh?
I just want to know I can be that person I used to be.  Feeling so lost right now, like "how did this happen to ME" feeling.
Helpful - 0
52704 tn?1387020797
you keep using because you suffer from the disease of addiction.

that doesn't make you bad, it makes you sick.  you may not be able to believe that now, but that's ok . . . it's true anyway.

you are not a bad person who needs to become good, you are a sick person who needs to become well.

since you already came clean to your husband, you can go ahead and get to work.

addiction is a deadly serious disease . . . it will eventually destroy you if it's not arrested, taking everything you care about as it does so.  that's the bad news.  

the good news is that it's EASILY treatable.  In "How it Works," AA's Big Book states "RARELY HAVE we seen a person fail who has thoroughly followed our path." I think that's absolutely true.  AA worked for me, and i quit failing as soon as i began to THOROUGHLY follow the path.  

i see the same thing in person after person that comes into the rooms.  the ones that THOROUGHLY follow the path get better and the ones who take half measure get nothing.  

i've been active in both AA and NA, but eventually settled on AA.  to me the programs are no different, it's just a matter of fit.  around here i always felt like an old man at NA meetings, but i was about average age for AA.

there are many people with good recovery in the rooms.  find some that "have what you want" and do what they did.

the first thing you can do is commit to going to 90 meetings in 90 days. Not too long ago this AA suggestion was favorably noted a Time article on addiction/recovery:  

"One important discovery: evidence is building to support the 90-day rehabilitation model, which was stumbled upon by AA (new members are advised to attend a meeting a day for the first 90 days) and is the duration of a typical stint in a drug-treatment program. It turns out that this is just about how long it takes for the brain to reset itself and shake off the immediate influence of a drug. Researchers at Yale University have documented what they call the sleeper effect--a gradual re-engaging of proper decision making and analytical functions in the brain's prefrontal cortex--after an addict has abstained for at least 90 days."

see http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1640436-3,00.html

You can recovery.  Just ask for help and accept it . . . like ibk said, it's free.

CATUF
2034

(seriously, if i can get better ANYONE can get better - you can do this)

Helpful - 0
1122748 tn?1306239764
tell everyone you can.. cut off supplies.. come clean, be clean...

i care.. i am sure your husband is tired too. start the new year right..

no more just in case ..

you are loved
Helpful - 0
271792 tn?1334979657
First things first---you are not a bad person or a low-life or whatever it is that you are thinking. You are probably a good person, you have a bad disease. You need to learn about the disease of addiction or the guilt and shame alone is going to keep you using. All that being said, admitting that you have a problem and understanding the disease is not a convenient excuse to use. Once you get clean and you are on your feet, you will have a choice to use or not.

I don't think you need to go to the ER. What would you tell them and what is it you think they will give you? If you tell them you are in withdrawal from opiates they will probably not give you anything. they may tell your doctor for you and it will go on record. Do you really want that?

Unless you have underlying medical problems, it is not a health risk to detox off of pain pills on your own. There are only a few things that are dangerous to do that with and you aren't taking any of them.

Didn't you say somewhere you have children? Unless you were out cold, child birth is much harder than opiate detox. You will have flu like symptoms for 4 or 5 days and then the physical part will diminish. Let us know what you are feeling and we can help you out with some home remedies.

Hang in there and ask any questions. this is a great place for support.
Helpful - 0
1470071 tn?1297625078
What do you think of going to the ER? I am also sick, I thinK I'm coming down with strep.  I am dreading WD this time and seriously considering just going to the ER and coming clean...maybe they can give me some clonodine?
Helpful - 0
1470071 tn?1297625078
I took my last pills last night and woke up this morning and when I realized that the first thought that crossed my mind was needing a pill, I became an emotional mess and came clean to my husband again.
I get prescribed them because of chronic daily tension/stress headaches..I have three kids under 4 and the pills just help with the stress I guess.  And yes, while I need them for the headaches, I got addicted to the high.   And that's why I keep coming back, I'll need "just one" for my head and ask my husband to give me one (he holds the pills because I don't trust myself with them) and then I think my mind makes up more pain so i'll keep giving it more pills.
I'd like to talk to someone, but I really am apprehensive about coming clean to my dr to get in with a therapist.  What type of therapist do you suggest? My insurance has something called magellen on the back to call for substance abuse.  Can't believe I'm actually associating myself with "substance abuse"... i feel so low
Helpful - 0
271792 tn?1334979657
Well, I won't call you an idiot and intelligence has nothing to do with it. You don't keep picking up the pills because you are dump, you keep picking up the pills because you haven't gotten to the cause of the problem.

As addicts we often start out with pain pills because of real pain. Then we find that we like the way they make us feel and continuing using them long after we need them.

After your third time doing this you are going to need to get humble and start listening to the people who have come before you and have learned to live life without the use of drugs. You will need outside support to do this. Whatever way you chose to do that, get going with it. Therapy is always a good choice if you have insurance. If not, the fellowships of NA & AA are free. I recommend both actually but you have to find what works best for you.

Have you stopped using yet?
Helpful - 0
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